Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe is on the fence about turning its highly profitable (and highly divisive) creature collector, Palworld, into a live service game. If it were to go that route, the game would switch to a free-to-play model.
Speaking with ASCII (via Automation), Mizobe was asked about the future of the creature collector, to which he admitted that things weren’t decided and the question of its model is a key issue for the studio. Currently, it comes with a fee of $29.99 before you can hop in, but the live service model also has a lot of allure for studios to keep making money beyond the standard one-off fee.
The problem falls that Palworld was built without those elements and implementing things such as skins and other things that people could buy with real money would be difficult to introduce. Mizobe also name-dropped Fall Guys and PUBG as premium products that went live service and reaped the benefits of it, after all, it’s “good for business,” but also notes that it wasn’t that simple.
“Both (games) took several years to make the shift. While I understand that the live-service model is good for business, it’s not that easy.”
Frankly, should Palworld go free-to-play and introduce live service elements, it’s hard to say how much it will draw an audience over new content, consistent updates, and even if so inclined, paid DLC. In the end, though, Pocketpair seems aware of the stigma behind live service games, as he also is taking into consideration whether or not players want the change.
